Wythenshawe Market is one year older than me. That's pretty old for a market. Not telling you how…read moreold exactly, but clearly it's testament to its enduring popularity. People come from far and wide for the wonderful produce here as the market predominately sells food. Everything from specialty cheese, deli products, chicken, fish, fruit and veg and baked goods can be bought here. However, there's also some great fashion bargains to be had on the clothes and shoe stalls as well as household and electrical goods. My favourite stalls sell great fabrics, knitting and haberdashery items and I've also found the cobbler handy for those shoe repairs!

Wythenshawe market has pretty much everything which you'd need to buy... There are a few butchers,…read morea fruit n veg stall, a cage and a couple of Asian and African food stall - great for buying scotch bonnet chilli's. The meat prices are very good at each butcher and they all seemed to be willing to help out when I enquired about getting obscure cuts of meat in for when I'm doing low n slow cooking at home on the bbq.

Warrington Market runs Monday to Saturday in Warrington town centre, a couple of minutes away from…read moreGolden Square Shopping Centre - it has both an indoor and outdoor market, although the outdoor area does seem much more popular in terms of business but I just don't see the hype sadly - with huge crowds, queues at certain stalls and people just walking past fresh produce smoking (I hate the smell and sight of smoke especially in a market which is supposed to be quality - surely areas like this should have a smoking ban like indoor locations are smoke-free in the UK?) The indoor area isn't much better it feels a little old - the dirty floor and horrible, rancid smells inside don't help - as soon as I entered I was forced to persevere past the horrible wind as you entered which blew the horrible smells right into your face which was simply vomit-inducing. It really does seem the growth of supermarkets which has had a bad effect on markets has affected this one - reviewers state this place was even in decline around ten years ago and by the looks of things, it seems to be surviving by the skin of its' teeth and it's really far from the place it once was. 1*

There are a few very good stalls of note in the market that have stood the test of time but…read moreunfortunately there are some not so good ones. That and the fact that more than a third seem to be empty means that the market is getting worse not better. It seems to be going in the direction of the rest of Warrington town centre, Downwards. Well done to the handful of good stalls on there. Notably the Game and Fish stalls along with a good veg stall. Mr Tasty brightens the place up and now has the largest stall in there. If a fraction of people in Warrington stopped using the supermarkets all the time and paid a Weekly or even Monthly visit to the Market then it may be able halt the decline and improve. The Stall I like include the following. African/Jamaican produce Caribbean Hot food store Cheese store Sausage Store Mr Tasty Butchers and cooked/roast food Veg store Game Store Fish monger For others there is a sports/angling store A cafe' Lots of clothes, shoes and bag store. A pet shop, hairdressers lots of place open and close in a short time. Last time I visited one of the three halls was almost empty.

It was M&S for coffees, Eccles cake and chocolate croissant today at M&S Altrincham; a rather…read moreupmarket posh village. The coffees were cappuccino and splendid Cortado. The iced water on tap. The village has a delightful market in the centre where one can buy dressed crab, cooked whole lobster and my absolute total, complete favourite, in all the world, potted brown shrimps, sealed in butter. Forget caviar and lobster this, with good buttered toast, is the true food of the gods. Ambrosia. There are flower sellers, cake sellers, sellers of LP's from the 1960's, cheese sellers offering small batch local cheeses, folks with woodfired ovens for sourdough pizzas, beer and wine sellers, upmarket hand made chocolates, oriental and Jamaican food (I don't think I could face goat curry) and a fish & chip shop. I'm sure I've left out a lot of purveyors in this snapshot. It's also teeming with competitively priced coffee places, cafes and bars and as the competition is so fierce there's no downmarket offerings.

Marks and Spencer in Altrincham is a fairly good location, although it isn't the best/biggest…read morelocation in the area, and I do prefer their Manchester Market Street and Bolton stores, this isn't a bad alternative and it is one of my favourite stores in Altrincham town centre. It has improved a lot since my last visit, the store is now much cleaner and free of clutter to warrant an upgraded rating. The selection in the food hall was good, they had a nice range of products, again this might be slightly less compared to other stores, but I still was able to find the majority of what I needed which was handy. This store is also using the new Mobile Scan and Pay, where you can scan items and bag them as you shop in the Food Hall, pay via your phone and walk out, this is a feature I love but it always makes me feel strange as you just walk out of the store, it makes you feel like a thief, even though you have paid, you do get a payment proof on your phone incase someone does stop you, but I am worried about the security of this if someone is dishonest. Most of the staff seemed friendly and happy to help when required. Above-average Marks and Spencer store, a great brand to have in Altrincham if you don't feel like going into the city centre or another larger store.

A decent ASDA store at the Cockhedge Centre in Warrington, a short walk away from the train station…read moreand town centre, it is in a good location and does have parking as expected. It could be better lit and sign-posted in the car-park area, especially for pedestrians as it did seem a little dangerous for me, as I struggled to find my way out. Pretty much an average ASDA, the selection was fine, I also like the Scan and Go app where you can use your mobile phone to scan items as you shop, to save time at the checkouts. The staff could have been slightly more helpful in regards to finding items. 3* - OK sums it up, multiple better ASDA stores (or supermarkets) in the area to do your shopping, but it's in a good location and useful for the people of Warrington.

Asda's telephone customer service at their Warrington Cockhedge store was absolutely appalling this…read moremorning and left me no option but to take my custom elsewhere. There was literally no one happy to help or to even help

weaver square in northwich, is the town centre and comprises of lots of shops with rows of shops…read moregoing of the square its self. There are several cafes and bars in northwich. It is clean and tidy with plenty of seats to sit down. Not too far is the local market which is open tuesday ,friday and ,sat. in the square its self there is a cafe and outdoor seating for the bay tree cafe. Northwich itself has lots of big shops, m&s , boots,superdrug,currys and WHS. northwich is all free parking at the moment.

Had a lovely afternoon wandering around here after a random weekend in Leek…read more Lots of shops and things to look at, little confusing signage for toilets etc but does the job! Has a massive primark with loads of choice as well. They also have a little market type place on the bottom floor which has quirky knitting stalls, beauty, DIY- pretty much anything you might need! Also have a couple of small 'builder- ish' kind of cafe's serving chips and breakfast stuff (which looks like it sits there for hours...beware!)

The Potteries Centre is the main shopping centre in Stoke-On-Trent. It was formerly known as Intu…read morePotteries until the parent company went into administration. The mall feels like it has so much potential, but that potential is wasted. There's such a large number of empty units now, and this is shown in "The Hive" with a row of closed restaurants which look like they've been empty for years - right next to Nando's and the Cineworld cinema. There's also a large amount of space in the mall which seems unused, including the pretty balcony, which just should be bustling. The staff around the mall were friendly, and they did try their best to offer assistance, although their knowledge of the local area could have been better as they struggled to recommend a supermarket nearby where I could buy essentials, including milk, to take back to my hotel. There's a small number of stores located here, nothing too exciting but certainly OK for a smaller city. Ann Summer, HMV, JD Sports New Look, Superdrug, Quiz and WHSmith have locations here, including all of the major mobile phone networks. The mall closes at 6 pm between Monday and Saturday, too, which does feel too early for a city. 2* - It feels that other than the rebrand, the mall hasn't changed for the better in years, and it's just depressing and declining.

Debenhams in Altrincham was a rather nice store and its closure is certainly a loss to Altrincham's…read moretown centre, reviewing a store which has since closed might be seen as irrelevant but I do hope this will still be of use to the brand which could be helpful for their other stores as Debenhams remains one of the largest department store chains in the UK. Despite the store is small, they still had a good selection for the size including multiple makeups and beauty counters, without them being too close together they form one giant unpleasant smell. Some of them did seem a little too pushy/eager compared to others though. The closing down sale at the store was also pretty good as it seemed they wanted to get rid of everything even down to the chairs they previously used for makeup/beauty treatment to other customers, they seemed to want to get rid of everything instead of taking it to other stores which is pretty good from a customer point of view, as it made this one of the cheapest Debenhams stores in the UK at one point. I do feel the store guide could have been clearer though, but this still remained a decent store and I'm sad to see it closed, although it was probably average and dwarfed compared to Debenhams stores in larger cities, it still was a nice brand to have in Altrincham.

One of the larger anchor stores of Golden Square Shopping Centre in Warrington - this store seems…read moreto be fairly popular based on Yelp reviews which date back eleven years (sadly this place has been unreviewed since the Qype days back then). This is a fairly small store by Debenhams standard, however, this must be expected to a degree with it being in a smaller town - there are much larger branches at Manchester Trafford, Manchester Market Street and Liverpool which are all 10-20 miles away, but this location still serves as a great location for click and collect for customers who might want Debenhams fashion without the travel (The click and collect desk could be in a better location compared to the Lower Ground floor but this seems to be common practice to force people to spend more time going through the store hoping they see more items along the way, you normally wouldn't see when online shopping) Again - due to the size of the store compared to others they did lack many facilities one would normally expect from Debenhams including many beauty brands which is a shame - they do however have a small cafe area, but unlike other stores, they don't have a juice bar or something similar. OK store for a small town - again I found this to be quite common for many stores within Warrington. "Meh I've experienced better", sums it up for me. 2*

I never thought I would see the day when Warrington Town centre had a Debenhams, but now we have…read moreour very own and I think it is fantastic! It may be a little smaller than the city centre debenhams, but it still stocks everything you could need. I love the designers at Debenhams range, particularly for children, and the fact that you can now buy Radley bags in the town centre is a bonus. The cafe on the top floor is brilliant as you can look out onto the whole shopping centre and have a nosey as to what everyone is getting up to.